


Demon's Best Friend

by BlueThorne



Series: Best of All Possible Worlds [5]
Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Dadgil Week (Devil May Cry), Everyone Is Alive, Family Fluff, Gen, Humor, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:40:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24919975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueThorne/pseuds/BlueThorne
Summary: If you're in some bad lighting and squint just enough, a Hellhound looks almost like a dog. That can make them hard to kill. At least, Nero thinks so. His father is much more concerned about having one in the house.Set post-Icarus; helps to have read the main story first, but can be read standalone.
Series: Best of All Possible Worlds [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1207059
Comments: 25
Kudos: 102





	Demon's Best Friend

**Author's Note:**

> I have a migraine, so I hope this is mostly coherent. Here's Dadgil Week day 5 for "tears" and "training."

I was always most concerned when the house was quiet because it truly was not a normal day until someone was causing a commotion. That particular sleepy Sunday afternoon was troublingly peaceful until Nero burst through the front door in a full sprint with his father racing to catch up. 

Nero was in tears, wheezing so hard from his sobs and running that he seemed seconds away from passing out on the hardwood floor. Vergil was equally out of breath but still struggling to gasp out a coherent sentence. 

After sipping my tea, I smiled. It was always good to see them so lively. “How did combat training go?” I asked.

“Father, he’s- he-” Vergil held the back of the couch with one hand, doubled over as he pointed at Nero with the other. “There’s a demon.” 

“Well, yes, he does have some demonic blood. You needn’t sound so upset about it.” 

Vergil’s eyes flashed toward me with a murderous, piercing gaze, so I looked to Nero once again. He had something in his arms, a little wriggling thing. Alongside sleek black fur were bits of bone and sinew, but I knew the creature to be in no pain. It had such a small presence that my son’s own rush of frantic demonic power had drowned it out from my notice. 

“Oh,” I said. “You found a hellhound, Nero?”

“Dad killed its parents!” Nero sobbed, fresh tears spilling from his eyes. He hugged the ugly runt closer, a fang-filled snout cuddled up to his cheek. 

“It’s a demon, an entirely animalistic beast of a demon,” Vergil hissed. Frays of bangs fell in front of his eyes as he ran his hand back through his hair. “It’s not like it has feelings toward its parents. Nero, please put it down. I won’t kill it. We can just leave it outside. I don’t care. Stop holding it.” 

Putting more distance between himself and his father, Nero instead stepped farther into the house. “But it’s alone, and it’s a baby,” he said. “It can’t live outside by itself.” 

“Father, please reason with him,” Vergil sighed. His eyes turned to me once again, pleading. 

While I had never been good at telling my sons no, the same could be said regarding Nero, who looked to me with the same desperate eyes as his father. Trying to make either of them see sense was also out of the question. 

“Nero, what do you plan to do with this hellhound?” I asked in hopes of appeasing them both. 

“Uh…” He looked down at the demon like this was the first time he’d considered such an idea. After a moment in which it pawed at his face with claws that would soon be big enough to cleave through him, he made his decision. “I will keep it. It’s alone now, so I gotta take care of it.”

In truth, hellhound pups were harmless excepting their vile scent of rot. Even the adults were not much of a threat, at least not for us. I’d seen Eva take out a pack of five with a shotgun and two rounds of ammunition. In a big enough swarm, they could be trouble, but they were more like the flies of the underworld than anything. 

Finding reasons that Nero shouldn’t keep it was just as difficult as finding reasons that he should.

“Nero,” Vergil attempted once again, a forced calm over his stress. “I know it seems helpless and like a dog, but it’s a demon. It will grow into a demon. It will not be a friendly dog. It will not need you to take care of it. Also, it smells horrible, and if Mom finds out we let it in the house, she will end us all.” 

“Oh, good point,” I said. I debated the merits of retrieving her from her workshop. Eva had no trouble telling the boys no when necessary, but letting her see what was going on would also earn all of us a heavy sigh and a lecture. 

“I'll give it a bath, so it won’t smell so bad,” Nero said. I was impressed he’d managed to keep it by his face for so long, but his crying may have stopped up his nose. 

Vergil winced at the idea. “I have a feeling that bathing it may result in more of its skin falling off, and then we will have wet rotting dog smell. Also, you did see that they catch on fire once they’re larger, right? It will be on fire soon, Nero.” 

“Well…” Nero toed at the floor, watching his feet until he came up with a solution. “It’s not on fire  _ yet _ .” 

A heavy silence set in over us as Nero and Vergil watched each other with blank stares. I was unsure what they were trying to accomplish, but Vergil looked like he needed to lie down.

“Here is a nice fact, Nero,” I said to start noise back up again. “Hellhounds wander in packs of many, so I’m certain this one has a family remaining beyond the ones your father killed.”

Though Vergil’s brow furrowed at the idea of more of them near the house, Nero let consideration settle in, and his defensive stance loosened. “Do you think they’ll take care of it?” Nero asked. 

“I believe so.” I had no idea. At the very least, they might eat it, so it wouldn’t go to waste. Best not to tell Nero that part, though. “And maybe if you let this one go, your father might let you have a real dog.”

“Why would we need a real dog when Dante lives and acts like one?” Vergil asked. 

I had trouble thinking of a good argument against that, but it seemed Vergil was just trying to avoid giving a definitive answer on the matter of a dog. 

Nero didn’t appear too concerned about real dogs. He was still frowning down at the creature in his arms, torn between what he thought to be right. With another sigh, Vergil walked up to his son, and Nero let him. “I’ll go with you,” Vergil said, kneeling down to his son’s level. “We’ll put it down back where it came from, and we’ll find some other demons to practice against next time, alright?”

“Do all demons have parents?” Nero asked. 

Vergil looked to me for help once again, a rare flash of uncertainty in his eyes. He seemed to know that there was no good answer to Nero’s worries. 

“Most do,” I admitted. “But at the same time, most demons do not believe in ‘family,’ or they do not know it as a concept. We’re a rare sort, Nero. Few demons feel anything in seeing death - whether that of human strangers or others of their kind.”

“I suppose this makes us better than them,” Vergil said as he reached up to brush the tears from Nero’s cheeks. “But it does make life more painful to care about others. You care a great deal, Nero. That’s… good, but that doesn’t mean we can look after demons who are likely to eat you. Unfortunately, they will not appreciate the effort.”

“Okay,” Nero huffed. “We can put it back outside, but I want a snake.”

Vergil’s temporary relief vanished as quickly as it had appeared. “You what?”

“Nonno said I got a dog if we put it back out, but I don’t want a dog. I want a snake, a really big one.”

“That’s not what he said!” I found myself once again pinned under a venomous glare from my son, so I went back to sipping my tea. “You’re not getting a snake, Nero.”

“Then I’m not putting the demon back outside.” 

“Nero, this isn’t a bargain.”

“What about a lizard?”

“Well, you already have your father for that,” I noted. Nero realized the truth in my statement and nodded along just as a summoned sword smashed my teacup to pieces. 


End file.
